Need help with an idea for a craft representing France..Si Vous Plait !

[Disneyatic]

Bonjour!
I have a brownie troop and we are participating in our council's World Thinking Day.
This year we have chosen France as our country to represent and I am totally drawing blank on a craft that we can have at our booth.
It has to be something fairly easy because the troops only have about 5 minutes at each country.
It also has to be fairly inexpensive because we will need to have the supplies for about 50-75 girls!

Any and all ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Merci ;)

[TinkiTime1989]

How about buying red, blue, and white sheets of foam and cutting them into strips. The girls can make them into flags and glue them onto popcicle sticks. You could also have a fact about France written on the back of each strip of foam for the girls to read about when they are done.

[sleepingbooty]

Wow - we are doing the same thing, except our country is Mexico. We're making little tacos for swaps. But we have to come up with a food to bring, and a display for our table. If I come across any good ideas for you while I'm doing my research for our troop, I'll let you know!

[BelleCiavo]

Sachets with lavender potpourri? You can buy dried lavender buds for about $10 a pound (a pound is a lot of lavender) on ebay and sachets in your local craft store. Maybe the girls could decorate the outside of the bag with fabric paint (their initials?)

[Disneyatic]

Thank you for all the ideas so far!

Our girls wanted Mexico or Italy but they were already taken, so our next pick was France.

We are good with our booth and presentation, we are having escargot for the adventurous and croissants for the non-snail people as our food samples! We also have berets for the girls to wear :thumbsup:
Just the craft part is holding us up!

[Scar]

How about a white surrender flag? ;)

[MsMin]

When I think of France I think of the Eiffel Tower, Can Can Dancers and Wine.
Can you make some little paper doll type stuff w/ laces to glue on for can can skirts? I was a troop leader many moons ago. If I did Can Can dancers I would have info on the history or significance of them.
I'm drawing a blank on the Eiffel Tower. Maybe you could have bright strips of yarn and build your own tower out of yard glued on construction paper.
What kind of a budget do you have to spend on this?

[Ian]

I took French for five years in school and one year for our craft project we made a small model of the Eiffel Tower out of little popcicle stick kinda things.

I'm pretty sure you could get a ton of those at a craft store, along with some glue, for not too much money.

[Disneyatic]

We have a pretty limited budget right now (all of our cookie $ from last year is spent!) but we can spend about $50 for the craft.

I like the Eiffel Tower ideas, that is a landmark that everyone recognizes. The time constraint would be my only concern because they only have about 5 minutes per booth.
I am going to have to do some experiments with popsicle sticks and also the yarn on paper and see what I come up with.

Thank you to everyone, keep them coming!

[CleveSJM]

My daughter did one of these recently and they did little "friendship" bracelets with blue, white and red string. They also had little letters to put on the bracelet with common french sayings, like "Bonjour", "Vive la France" and, as Scar suggested, "I surrender"...;):D;)

[browneyedgirl12]

Maybe you could do something with the Statue of Liberty since it was a gift from france. Like build it out of play dough or something and have a little bit of history prepared to tell people as they walk up to your booth. Just an idea :thumbsup:

[NJBelle]

Perhaps you could bake crepes and have samples for all the people who come to your booth. You can find recipies for crepes any where. A great touch would be to use little Frech flage toothpicks in each littler sample. Or since Paris is the fashion capital of the world, you could all dress as fashion modles. (maybe not such a great idea)
Hope that helped.

*oooh! 200th post! Yippy!*

[RoosMomKanga]

As a former Troop leader and Art teacher...5 min. for a craft is lightning fast...elmers glue with craft sticks would be hard to make and take since it won't dry that fast.
After reading the posts I had a thought...what about a Can Can dancer like someone mentioned, but more like a finger puppet (but not the kind you just put on a finger). Picture a small paper doll with her arms stretched out and withouut any legs...now make two holes in the hips and insert your fingers through for legs...yes, now she's doing the Can-Can...wow, she can do the splits! You'll need something flat and fairly heavy for the body- either fun foam or heavy tag board paper. Personally, I would pre-cut all the bodies (make sure you leave extra thickness around the finger holes so they won't rip out easily...yes, she'll be hippy) and have the craft be just about decorating them. I'd suggest you even take strips of scrap fabric and gather them (can do this as you glue or baste sew and pull-you could do a super long strip and get many skirts out of this) across the waist and HOT glue it down for a full short skirt that will cover the top of the leg/hip area. You can supply some markers for the faces, etc. and you can probably get Mom's from you Troop to donate leftovers for decorating the skirt/making a top- ribbons, trims, yarn, beads, (and you must have a feather for her hair!). Have fun! :thumbsup:

[DisneyDudet]

OK, I'm not artsy or crafty person, but what about drawing portraits, like the Mona Lisa? Teaching them about art and stuff, since the best art museum is the Louvre in Paris!

I just got back from Paris a month ago, and there's art EVERYWHERE!!

At church, when they learn about missionaries, the little kids went in the hall, wearing their barets, and painting on the wall (well.. drawing on easels or paper put on the wall for murals).

It was way cute!!!

So, I don't know what else to tell you. Umm... what about making roses, since it is the city of romance? To old for them? Probably.

What about teaching them about the gargoyles on the churches, and having them make one out of clay or playdoh to take home?

I don't know... I'm spent!

If you want to see some pictures for ideas, let me know!

[Kairi_7378]

Wow... 5 minutes is very little time for a craft. I like the crepe idea.

[DisneyLandMomma]

Did you decide on anything yet?? I just learned from my co-leader we are doing France too. LOL So I appreciate all the ideas everyone has suggested too!! :)

[Disneyatic]

Thank you so much to everyone for all the ideas and input.
We still haven't completely decided on a craft yet but we have narrowed it down to a few ideas...
We are either going to have the girls do gargoyles or snails out of clay OR something fashion related, like decorate a mirror. I am not sure if the girls will get that Paris is a major fashion center, but we will see.
We have decided on Cheese and Baguets as our food sample and may do a fondue (not sure about fire!). We also have escargot and wine (Welch's sparkling grape juice) that we are going to display. We thought about buying plastic wine glasses and giving them to each girl with some of the sparkling grape juice, but we don't want to offend anyone.
I have berets for the girls to wear also!

Thank you again to everyone for your input!

[TheMartellFamily]

I like the idea about the friendship braclets since the french is known for fashion. This would be a very in expensive way to show what France is about. The other idea would be just to have a few different kinds of cheese a small pretzel sticks since this is another way to show what France is all about. This would give them a taste and just have small nibbles of them.

[DisneyDog]

I can't help but think of that John Cusak movie from the 80's called Better Off Dead. There was a foreign exchange student from France, staying at the neighbor's house. The mother has her over for dinner and says "In honor of our dinner guest, tonight we have French fries, French bread, and French dressing....":rotfl:

[DisneyDudet]

I like the idea about the friendship braclets since the french is known for fashion. This would be a very in expensive way to show what France is about. The other idea would be just to have a few different kinds of cheese a small pretzel sticks since this is another way to show what France is all about. This would give them a taste and just have small nibbles of them.

Fashion.. yes. Friendly... NOT AT ALL! They have to be the rudest people!

[DisneyDudet]

OK, I have put my pictures up online for you to see (or anyone who wants to!). I will PM you my link.

Anyone else who wants to see Paris and DISNEYLAND PARIS pictures, PM me!

[SBETigg]

Growing up, my husband spent summers and his whole sixth grade year in France. They rented a house in Duras and the people were charming, lovely, and very welcoming.

In choosing a craft idea, I would keep away from anything having to do with Can Can dancers, as it is not entirely an appropriate subject for a Brownie troop. You may run into some truths that you would rather not explain to young girls or their parents. :blush: